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A tale of love and darkness

Based on the international best seller by Amos Oz, the story of his youth, set against the backdrop of the end of the British Mandate for Palestine and the early years of the State of Israel. The film details the young man's relationship with his mother and his beginnings as a writer, while looking at what happens when the stories told, become the stories lived.

Opinion

From the critics

Community Activity

Quotes

Do you remember what I told you about the word "flower"? Flower is a combination of the words "bull" and "scent." "Bull" has the same root as "fertility," and "scent" lures the insects that fertilize the plant.
===
Remembering is like trying to restore an old building with the stones from its ruins. And the stones have memory.
===
My mother grew up in an ethereal culture of misted beauty whose wings were finally dashed on the harsh Jerusalem stone, hot and dusty. Twenty years after completing her studies in Rovno, that romantic schoolgirl was confronted by daily life, the heat waves, poverty, and violence, diapers, migraines, ration lines, marriage. The promise of her childhood was trampled underfoot and ridiculed by the monotony of life itself. Perhaps when life failed to fill the promises of her youth, my mother began to envision death as a protective, soothing lover.

Once upon a time there was a village, abandoned by its inhabitants... Even the rats left. Even the rats left. The village stood silent and abandoned, year after year. Rain pounded the streets, washing away any human trace. When the rats cleared, birds swarmed over the village. There were so many, they almost blocked out the sky. It was night, all day long. But then, from one small house... A little boy opened the door. He was the only one left behind. My mother was 38 when she died. At my age today, I could be her father. Many things have happened in Jerusalem. The city was destroyed, rebuilt, destroyed and rebuilt again. Conqueror after conqueror came, ruled for a while, left behind some walls, some towers, some cracks in the stones, and then disappeared, like the morning mist down the hillslopes. Jerusalem's a black widow, who devours her lovers while they are still inside her.

Fanitchka? I joined the national guard. Don't you have anything to say about that?
-What do you want me to say? Congratulations. You're very brave.
===
The war infiltrated our home. Life became rations, sandbags, mourning. In the lives of individuals, and in the lives of nations, the worst conflicts erupt between two persecuted people. Only in the imagination do the persecuted unite in solidarity to fight together against their ruthless oppressor. In reality, two children of the same abusive father will not necessarily become allies. Often, each sees in his brother their father's threatening ways. Europe abused the Arabs, humiliating them with colonialism... And the same Europe persecuted and annihilated the Jews. But the Arabs see us as an arrogant new branch of European colonialism and exploitation, and we do not see Arabs as brothers in adversity, but rather, as anti-semites, Nazis in disguise. ...after 30 years of the British mandate...

If you have to choose between telling a lie or insulting someone, choose to be generous.
-I'm allowed to lie?
Sometimes... yes. It's better to be sensitive than to be honest.
===
You can find hell and paradise in every room. A little meanness, and people are hell to each other. A little compassion, a little generosity, and people find paradise in each other.
===
Bullies may well bully you someday in the street or at school. They may do it just because you're a bit like me. But from now on, now that we have our own state, you will never be bullied just because you are a Jew. Never again.

Do you remember what I told you about the word "flower"? Flower is a combination of the words "bull" and "scent." "Bull" has the same root as "fertility,"
and "scent" lures the insects that fertilize the plant.
===
Remembering is like trying to restore an old building with the stones from its ruins. And the stones have memory.
===
My mother grew up in an ethereal culture of misted beauty whose wings
were finally dashed on the harsh Jerusalem stone, hot and dusty. Twenty years after completing her studies in Rovno, that romantic schoolgirl was confronted by daily life, the heat waves, poverty, and violence, diapers, migraines, ration lines, marriage. The promise of her childhood was trampled underfoot and ridiculed by the monotony of life itself. Perhaps when life failed to fill the promises of her youth, my mother began to envision death as a protective, soothing lover.

Once upon a time there was a village, abandoned by its inhabitants... Even the rats left. Even the rats left. The village stood silent and abandoned, year after year. Rain pounded the streets, washing away any human trace. When the rats cleared, birds swarmed over the village. There were so many, they almost blocked out the sky. It was night, all day long. But then, from one small house...
A little boy opened the door. He was the only one left behind. My mother was 38 when she died. At my age today, I could be her father. Many things have happened in Jerusalem. The city was destroyed, rebuilt, destroyed and rebuilt again. Conqueror after conqueror came, ruled for a while, left behind some walls,
some towers, some cracks in the stones, and then disappeared, like the morning mist down the hillslopes. Jerusalem's a black widow, who devours her lovers while they are still inside her.

Fanitchka? I joined the national guard. Don't you have anything to say about that?
-What do you want me to say? Congratulations. You're very brave.
===
The war infiltrated our home. Life became rations, sandbags, mourning. In the lives of individuals, and in the lives of nations, the worst conflicts erupt between two persecuted people. Only in the imagination do the persecuted unite in solidarity to fight together against their ruthless oppressor. In reality, two children of the same abusive father will not necessarily become allies. Often, each sees
in his brother their father's threatening ways. Europe abused the Arabs, humiliating them with colonialism... And the same Europe persecuted and annihilated the Jews. But the Arabs see us as an arrogant new branch of European colonialism and exploitation, and we do not see Arabs as brothers in adversity, but rather, as anti-semites, Nazis in disguise. ...after 30 years
of the British mandate...

If you have to choose between telling a lie or insulting someone, choose to be generous.
-I'm allowed to lie?
Sometimes... yes. It's better to be sensitive than to be honest.
===
You can find hell and paradise in every room. A little meanness, and people are
hell to each other. A little compassion, a little generosity, and people find paradise in each other.
===
Bullies may well bully you someday in the street or at school. They may do it just because you're a bit like me. But from now on, now that we have our own state,
you will never be bullied just because you are a Jew. Never again.

Comment

Originally posted on Oct 05, 2017 - Knew that Portman is one of the smartest actress anywhere. After this film, one accomplished director and screenplay writer as well. A poignant account of a boy, an only child, growing up in Jerusalem with his tragic mother and learned father during the dawn of Israel when there was hope for peace between the local Arab and Jewish settlers. What a tumultuous yet exciting historic time.